Merging selected case studies with textual analyses, this book explores the field of Comparative North American Literature through writers diverse as Margaret Atwood and Tim O'Brien. Topics include the North American modernist short story, narratives of the Canada-US border, and a never before released interview with Atwood.

In the first book-length history of the Italian American syndicalist movement-the Italian Socialist Federation-Michael Miller Topp presents a new way of understanding the Progressive Era labor movement in relation to migration

In 1678, the Puritan minister Samuel Nowell preached a sermon he called "Abraham in Arms," in which he urged his listeners to remember that "Hence it is no wayes unbecoming a Christian to learn to be a Souldier." The title of Nowell's sermon was well chosen. Abraham of the Old Testament resonated deeply with New England men, as he embodied the ideal of the householder-patriarch, at once obedient to God and the unquestioned leader of his family and his people in war and peace. Yet enemies challenged Abraham's authority in New England: Indians threatened the safety of his household, subordinates in his own family threatened his status, and wives and daughters taken into captivity became baptized Catholics, married French or Indian men, and refused to return to New England.